{"id":24450,"date":"2026-02-04T07:24:22","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T07:24:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/141.23.68.248\/wp\/?page_id=24450"},"modified":"2026-02-09T21:24:58","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T21:24:58","slug":"drinking-water-distribution-mains","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/141.23.68.248\/wp\/?page_id=24450","title":{"rendered":"Drinking Water Distribution Mains"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Drinking water distribution mains represent essential long-lived civil infrastructure with the accumulation of environmental impacts across the service life. Selecting suitable materials for the pipe influences not only the initial construction impact but also long-term maintenance, rehabilitation requirements, sustainability and economy.
This study 1km DN200 buried drinking water main located in a German urban residential area supplying water from storage tank by Natalie’s water supply system. It is located besides the 100 m road and DN300 sewer pipe with attached manhole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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1. Pipeline Design Options<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

There are 3 design pipeline design that are being considered for this integration which are Ductile iron, Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) and High-Density Polyethylene (HDPE). Pipeline size DN200 is chosen as the main pipeline size with 200 nominal diameter in mm, mean outside diameter is 229.87 mm and mean inside diameter of 217.17 which gives mean thickness of 6.35mm (Piratla, Ariaratnam & Cohen, 2012). In the integration system, Ductile Iron pipe is chosen as the design material as you can see the date supporting this material option at the end. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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2. Environmental Factors<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Four environmental factors are selected in this study which are total primary energy use and carbon dioxide (\u00d6KOBAUDAT, 2024), nitrogen oxides and sulphur dioxide emissions (EEA, 2019). These indicators were calculated based on the boundary of the system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Environmental indicators<\/td>Values<\/td><\/tr>
Total Energy Use<\/td>20580 MJ\/t<\/td><\/tr>
Carbon Dioxide emissions<\/td>9855 kg\/m^3<\/td><\/tr>
Nitrogen Oxides emission<\/td>14.6 kg\/m^3<\/td><\/tr>
Sulphur Dioxide emissions<\/td>11.7 kg\/m^3<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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3. Life Cycle Interventions<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The intervention events and the frequencies were selected to shows the typical deterioration mechanisms and maintenance actions associated with the design chosen. Leak repairs, partial replacement, internal\/external pipe rehabilitation (lining) are the most common interventions in long-term water pipeline studies (Piratla, Ariaratnam & Cohen, 2012). The frequencies also align with expected service life ranges with approximate lifespans of 100 years<\/strong> for ductile iron (Teichmann et al., 2020).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Detail Event<\/td>Event<\/td>Frequency<\/td>Pipe Fraction<\/td><\/tr>
Leak repair<\/td>LR<\/td>30<\/td>0.01<\/td><\/tr>
Partial pipe
replacement<\/td>		PR<\/td>60<\/td>0.20<\/td><\/tr>
Internal\/external
pipe
rehabilitation
(lining)<\/td>		IEPR<\/td>80<\/td>0.10<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

However in the integration system, Leak repair event is not included in the maintenance integration as it does not represent stochastic, failure-driven interventions rather than planned periodic maintenance actions. The maintenance framework used in this study is based on deterministic intervention frequencies and durations which allows maintenance activities to be aligned and optimized across integrated systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Intervention timeline for each pipe material design option over 100 years analysis horizon was generated using the Shiny-based tool<\/strong> provided in the course tutorial. Figure below illustrate the scheduled leak repairs, partial replacements and lining events based on the frequencies. It aim to shows the realistic maintenance behavior within 100 years analysis horizon which is consistent with the respective lifespan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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4. Total 100-year Life Cycle Impacts<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Figures shows PVC remains the highest from all environmental indicators due to the full pipe replacement every 60 years. It significantly increase the energy demand and resulted to air pollutant emissions. meanwhile the HDPE has lower value than PVC but higher than the ductile iron in all environmental factors due to its major rehabilitation at year 100 which increases the total energy compared to DI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Comparison of the results from individual project, ductile iron pipe is the best option to be used in this integration system. Ductile iron pipe has the lowest total energy consumption with 859,473 MJ. Similar pattern was detected in climate change impacts. Result indicate ductile iron is still the best performance as it releases the least carbon dioxide of 82,740 kg primarily due to its low embodied CO2 per kilogram compared with plastics. Also the lowest Nitrogen Oxide and Sulphur Dioxide emissions which are 232 kg and 118 kg respectively. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Carbon Dioxide Emissions<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Nitrogen Oxides Emsissions<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Sulphur Oxides Emissions<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Total Energy Used<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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5. Life-Cycle Cost Analysis (LCCA)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Next, the Life-Cycle Cost Analysis had been done to determine the best cost for all 3 materials. The cost included are the material cost for raw materials extraction, material processing and pipe manufacturing. Construction (Piratla et al., 2012), maintenance and repairs cost are also added up. Results show that PVC has highest total cost due to full replacement at year 60, HDPE has moderate cost from major rehabilitation at year 100
and DI has lowest maintenance cost due to long service life and fewer major interventions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ductile iron is ranked 1st, followed by PVC and HDPE. Therefore, Ductile Iron that has been chosen for this system integration as it has the lowest life-cycle cost analysis. Below shown the overall cost for the Ductile Iron for each section.<\/p>\n\n\n\n